Joel van Houdt (b. 1981, Netherlands) is an independent photojournalist based in London.

He studied Photography and Design in Bradford, UK, and graduated from the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague in 2003, where he focused on a project about the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.

Joel began his career as a freelance photojournalist in 2002, working in the Netherlands and on long-term projects across the former Soviet Union. His work in 2003 earned him the Dutch Canonprijs, awarded to photographers under 30.

In 2007, he began documenting the life of a Moroccan refugee in his project Entering Europe, which followed the subject before, during, and after their migration to Spain. The resulting photographs and multimedia were exhibited at Gemak in the Netherlands in 2009 and won Best Picture at Germany's Lead Academy in 2011.

What began as a six-month project in Afghanistan in 2010 turned into a five-year stay, with regular returns until 2022. This work will be published in a book in 2025.

In 2017, Joel exhibited Kuja Meri?, a project on Afghan refugees, on blast walls in the heart of Kabul.

After moving to Ukraine in 2015 and then to Russia in 2016, Joel was based there until 2020. He has since settled in north-west London.